Note 41 — Chapter XII · 1884. ‘TWELFTH NIGHT’—‘THE VICAR OF WAKEFIELD’—OXFORD HONOURS.

I recall a Sunday morning during this visit, when a message arrived from the manager asking me to join a festive party to Dorking, to which he had invited some members of the French comedy. At the Garrick Club, the favourite coach, “Old Times,” was waiting, and presently it was “Buzz!—here come the players.” A delightful drive it was, and a truly enjoyable day. There was Mounet Sully, the fervent stage lover—then, it was whispered, the prey of a hopeless attachment to the gifted “Sarah”—the spirituel Delaunay, still a jeune premier in spite of his years; with two or three others of the corps. Of the party were also my friend Mr. Walter Pollock, with his genial, well-cultured father, the late Sir Frederick; Campbell Clarke, French correspondent to the Daily Telegraph, and some other littérateurs. There was the drive down to the inviting little town, with a lunch at the old inn, some wanderings about its leafy lanes, and a return in the evening to the club, where the host gave a banquet, at which speeches in French and English were delivered. The interesting strangers took away with them the lasting impression that he was “truly a sympathetic personage, with a great deal of French grace and bonhomie in his nature.”